


Musings of a Possible Fragment

by ZanderNyrond



Category: The Man In Room 17/The Fellows
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-24
Updated: 2015-07-24
Packaged: 2018-04-10 23:47:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4412654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ZanderNyrond/pseuds/ZanderNyrond
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An exploration of the contradictions inherent in a premise.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Musings of a Possible Fragment

_(DIMMOCK is walking through one of Cambridge's pleasant places, swinging his stick and generally disporting himself. As he walks, we hear his thoughts.)_

DIMMOCK (V.O.): There's a rumour going around that I am not real.

As near as I can gather, the substance of it seems to be that Oldenshaw and I were usually referred to as "The _Man_ In Room 17." Which, given that there were in fact two of us, is at very least somewhat discourteous to one of us.

Of course, if either of us could lay claim to being "the" Man, or perhaps "ther" Man--you know what "ther" means, don't you?--it would be Oldenshaw. Edwin G. Oldenshaw. The senior man, the man with a degree from a better place--though not, I fancy, a better degree. I, lowly Ian Dimmock, could scarcely measure up. And yet I was there. I existed. I made a contribution.

And yet the argument is that one of us--and we know which one, don't we?--is merely an artifact, a thought-form or projection or astral double from the mind of the other. Or, in the alternative, that both of us are projections or whatever from the mind of one composite Man in Room 17. What would he be called, I wonder? Oldendim? Oh God, I hope not. Mockshaw? Shadmock? Who was it who said that shadmocks only whistle? We did a fair amount of metaphorical whistling, as the darkness deepened around us. And no, the coincidence of our initials had not escaped me. EGO and ID. A point in the argument's favour, perhaps.

And yet people saw us, both of us. Spoke to us. We had separate telephones, for heaven's sake, what more solid proof of separate existence could one require? Unless one were to postulate that the entire room--Room 17 itself--were but a projection of some real room in a real world, and that the people who seemed to enter it and converse with the two of us were merely images of themselves, while the real people talked in the real room with the real, singular, occupant.

But then what would one make of this? Could the entire city of Cambridge be a projection of itself? Anthem and Mrs Hollinsczech mere images, or perhaps further shards from an increasingly fragmented personality? If we are indeed separate aspects of one person, I can't imagine he's a very well-balanced one. The crises we have gone through together--if we have--are sufficient proof of that.

A man sets out to contemplate the phenomenon that we call crime. He sets himself--or is set--puzzles to solve, and solves them all right for a while, but then the nature of crime itself begins to obsess him. He engages in furious internal dialogues with another self created for the purpose--or selves, of course--leading to withdrawal, sulks, agonies of the mind, a dark night of the soul. The puzzle is insoluble, the enigma irrefragable. Send for the men in white coats, gentlemen, and find two sober medical students to sign the certificate.

Go too far along that road, and you start to wonder if any of it was ever real. Did we solve crimes? Was there a Room 17? Am I here, now, walking in a real university town in a real country? Is anything real?

Of course, here of all places, the jury is still out on that question. No verdict expected in the foreseeable future.

Ah, well. I suppose it could be worse. If we are fictitious, then compared with other fictitious double-acts, it seems we have got off rather lightly. When one considers...no. Quite definitely no. I had rather be an astral projection than a physical...whatever.

On the whole, yes, it could be a lot worse.

 

 


End file.
